


between then and now

by fruectose



Series: gifts for my friends <3 [3]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: F/M, Marijuana, alcohol use, its imperative that you watch the film!!, someone great au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 23:40:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29197746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fruectose/pseuds/fruectose
Summary: Somewhere between then and now, here and there–I guess we didn’t just grow apart; we grew up.are endings and beginnings all that different? entirely inspired by netflix's someone great (2019).
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson
Series: gifts for my friends <3 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2160090
Comments: 13
Kudos: 68





	between then and now

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bluepinstripes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluepinstripes/gifts).



_ Sometimes, things don’t break; they shatter. But when you let the light in, shattered glass will glitter. And in those moments – when the pieces of what we were catch the sun – I’ll remember just how beautiful it was. Just how beautiful it always will be. Because it was us. And we were magic. Forever.  
_

_ ~ Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, Someone Great (2019) _

* * *

Their story begins at the end, and their end began like this:

“I got the job.”

The words were somewhat garbled and blurted out with her head in her hands and there was a pause long enough that Annabeth had to peek through her fingers. Percy blinked back at her, mouth open and fork full of pasta forgotten mid-air. He set it down and his face broke into a massive grin and in retrospect, maybe she should have paid more mind to the beat in between. He reached out and took her hands and leaned over their table and kissed her on the lips and he looked happy for her when he said:

“Congratulations, gorgeous. I’m so proud of you.”

Their end began when they clinked their wine glasses and held hands on the walk back to their apartment and chose not to ask the question. The end began when she noticed the tension in his brow and chose not to let it bother her on a day when she’d received exciting news. Their end began when he listened to her talk and chose not to pay mind to the places on this earth that she would go that were too far for him to follow. Their end began when they stoked the flames that would set them ablaze and called it hearth.

Later, he’d push her up against their front door and press his chest to hers and cling on to her a little bit tighter than he normally would and she’ll pretend not to feel it. Her lips will hold his more desperately and the impressions of her nails will last on the skin of his back a little longer and she’ll cover up the purple bruises on her neck and he’ll pretend not to see it. And then, when she curls up into his side and rests her head on his chest, when the rhythm of his heart beats under her palm, when the end seems inevitable, they’ll look the other way.

Cowards, the both of them.

  
  


*

“What are you looking at?”

Perhaps those are the words that set their end in motion- the very start. They were only seventeen years old- a long, bright future ahead of them. She was clever and he was determined and there was nothing in the world to stop them from taking over the world. 

They were lying on her bed, his leg draped over her knees. He was playing absently with an unsolved Rubix cube- either solving it or making it harder to solve, neither of them could tell. His hair was messy from her hands having run through them, and his lips swollen to match hers.

She looked up distractedly from her laptop and worried her lip for a moment.

“Nothing.” She said on instinct. Then her shoulders slumped. “Just stuff. You know. For college.”

“You decide on a major yet?” He asked, reaching out and twirling her hair around his finger.

She hesitated for a second. They’d only been together for a little over a year.  _ Some secrets are best kept close to your heart _ , her dad liked to say. Percy looked up at her from her pillows with twinkling eyes and her chest squeezed with emotion.  _ Close to your heart _ , she reminded herself. What could ever get closer.

“I’m thinking… Columbia has this architecture course.” She floated the idea. “I like to draw, and I like math. I don’t know. It’s probably stupid.”

If he were anyone else, he might have laughed. Annabeth had never voiced any interest in architecture before. It was random and foolish and someone should have told her not to aim so high.

“I think you’d be pretty fucking badass.” Percy said. “You know. If that’s what you chose to do.”

Her smile was radiant. “It makes no sense.” It filled her with excitement anyway.

“I think it’s kind of perfect, actually.” Percy shook his head. “You can be a math nerd _ and  _ you don’t have to give up on developing your creative skills.”

A beat passed and he reached over her, wrapping his hand around her ankles and uncrossing them. Slowly, he rolled her onto him and pulled her closer until he could press a kiss to her hip.

“Besides,” He said quietly. “Columbia will be right here. With me.”

Annabeth would have been lying if she said it didn’t play some role in her choosing the course. They hadn’t been together for too long, really, but she wasn’t ready to let it go just yet. Not when there was the option of having Percy and doing what seemed like a fun degree. She set her laptop down and tangled her fingers in his hair.

“Yeah.” She said. He’d be in NYU on his swimming scholarship and she’d be at Columbia and within the safe confines of New York City, they would start the rest of their lives together. “Where else would I possibly be?”

Percy had his eyes closed when he answered. “Oh, you’ll go places, baby.” 

He wasn’t shy about pushing her t-shirt up enough to expose her skin to the cool air. He trailed kisses along her hip bone and nuzzled her waist with his nose. It had only been one year. They would live like this for eternity. Percy shook his head, his breath warm against her.

“Nowhere without you.” Annabeth told him. 

“Like I’d let you.”

*

  
They began earlier still, when Annabeth locked herself in Katie Gardener’s bathroom and cried until she couldn't breathe.

Nobody came for her- nobody ever had. Luke sure as hell didn’t come. Her chest ached and the tears didn't stop flowing. There was a knock on the door and she didn't have it in her to respond.

“Annabeth?”

Percy was so soft, so gentle in comparison to his rowdy singing in the living room. He was tender with her the way she knew he only ever was with her. His voice carried clearly over the Black Eyed Peas from the hallway and through the hardwood door and dripped with concern.

“I’m in here.” She managed. She could barely breathe.

“Okay.” He said. “Try taking deep breaths in and then drawing them out. It helps.”

“I’m okay.”

There was a pause and she thought maybe he’d left. He  _ should _ have left- she was being silly, crying over a boy the way she was. She looked down at her hands on her lap and tried to focus on her chest- rising and falling and  _ not _ overflowing with rejection and pain. She sat there for a while- she imagined full minutes had passed- before he knocked again.

“I’m still here.” Percy told her. He hesitated a little, like he wanted to say more. “I- I’m still here.”

Annabeth played with her fingers. “I’m okay.” She repeated.

“Okay. I’ll just wait for you.”

Neither of them said anything. Annabeth waited for long enough to convince herself that he’d left before pulling herself off the bathroom floor and unlocking the door- only to almost fall over him. He looked up from his place on the ground with hooded eyes and a small smile and her chest didn’t ache anymore. He held his hand out and she let him lean on her as he got clumsily onto his feet and dusted himself off. His arm weighed heavy on her shoulders but he has never been a burden; never on Annabeth. 

“He doesn’t deserve you.” He said, leading her to Katie’s bed. He was careful in the way he wiped her tears. She imagined her mascara streaked over his thumbs. “You are extraordinary.” 

They were too young to be as drunk as they were. They were teenagers with problems that felt like the end times in a universe with jagged edges designed to slice them open. She was a little bit heartbroken and he was a little bit heartbroken for her and within their inexperience, their lips touched and the world stopped hurting. He was so deliberate in the way his palms held her face. His hair felt right between her fingers and just that easily, everything that she had ever chased fell into her arms.

_ Puppy love _ . She’ll never think of Luke again after Percy takes her hand and doesn’t let go.

*

Maybe the end was fifteen years in the making; maybe their end was that stupid first place medal that hangs to this day on their bedroom wall.

Annabeth was  _ one _ race away from bagging  _ every _ gold medal the school had to offer.

She glanced over her shoulder at the stands as the referee called for the runners to fall into their tracks. She couldn’t see them yet, but they were there. She was pretty sure they were there. After all, had Josephine not looked her in the eye before promising that the entire family would come to cheer her on?

This was it. This was the day; for the first time in her ten long years of life, her dad would notice her. He’d notice her when she came home with  _ ten _ gold medals, previously unheard of in any elementary school track and field race. She hoped he’d take her out to dinner like he did her brothers when they graduated kindergarten. Maybe even give her a hug or tell her he was proud of her. This was  _ her _ moment, and  _ nobody  _ could take that away from her.

“Hey, Blondie.”

Annabeth started slightly and turned around. It was  _ him _ . She didn’t know his name, but she knew he was her biggest competition. He was going home with a fair few silver medals of his own, and in the last race she’d only beaten him by a hair. If anybody jeopardised her record-breaking victory, it was this kid. She crossed her arms over her chest.

“What?”

The coach called for the racers to take their place. “On your mark!”

Annabeth knelt into a lunge and leaned forward, giving her hamstrings a stretch. The boy was in the lane beside her and looked back at her. His green eyes sparkled and his grin was full of mischief.

“Get set!”

“Your shoelace is untied.”

“Wh-?” Annabeth looked down at her Nikes. She’d  _ just _ re-tied them.

“Go!”

“See ya!” The kid darted off ahead of her, and in the moment it took for Annabeth to gather her wits, all the other participants overtook her.

“Hey! You cheated!” She cried, trying her absolute hardest to cover the distance between them.

It took everything she had- and ironically, that might have been her best race to date- to close the gap between them. She focused solely on his race bib, his neon green t-shirt and those offensively graceful legs. She was almost there, she was close enough to see the dust that his shoes kicked up with every step. She was gaining on him, she was almost there-

The pair of them sailed past the finishing line, Annabeth only half a step behind him. He slowed to a halt and turned around, punching his arms up in the air in victory, but Annabeth was less prepared for the stop. She slammed right into him, sending them both tumbling into the sand. Her only triumph over him in that race was that she managed to land on top of him- at least  _ her _ fall was somewhat cushioned. She heard him grunt and curse loudly into her ear.

“Dude, what the hell?” He groaned from under her. For a moment, Annabeth was too shocked to respond. Then she pushed herself off his chest and glared at him. That was  _ exactly _ the kind of language her father didn’t allow in their home. She stood up and crossed her arms over her chest.

“ _ You’re _ the one who cheated.” She accused. The boy took a moment, like he wasn’t sure what to make of her, and then grinned as he sat up.

“Stop being a baby.” He said. “You’re just a sore loser.”

“Only because you  _ stole _ my win.”

“Did  _ not _ .” He said, getting to his feet and stepping closer to her. His face contorted into a scowl.

“You lied about my shoelaces!”

“You’re the one who looked!”

Annabeth made a face at him. He stuck his tongue out at her. 

“Shut up.” Annabeth snapped.

“I didn’t say anything.”

Annabeth had bigger things to worry about than this stupid boy. She looked around the bleachers. All the parents were making their way down to congratulate their kids. She still couldn’t find her family. The only person making their way over was a woman with sunglasses on her nose and a kind smile on her lips. She caught up to them and gave the boy a big hug.

“Honey, you did so well! I’m so proud of you, Pumpkin.” She said, pressing kisses to the top of his head. “Six silvers and a gold!”

If Annabeth had the time, she might have gloated. She had  _ nine _ golds and a silver- but she wasn’t the one being wrapped in a hug and being congratulated. She felt a pang in her chest that brought tears to her eyes. There was a pause, when she swallowed down her disappointment and braced herself for the familiar long, lonely walk home. And then-

“You did fantastic today, sweetie.” The lady said, and it took Annabeth a while to realise she was talking to her. She blinked back. “Are your parents here?”

_ They probably forgot about me, like they usually do _ was too embarrassing to say, so Annabeth shook her head.  _ They promised _ .

“You can come get some ice cream with us- you know. Once we’re given our medals.” The boy said and his mother beamed at him like he’d just come first place in their science fair for building a fully functional robot. (Annabeth had done that- her parents never showed to see.)

“We’ll just go down the way.” His mom said as she fished her phone out of her bag. “Do you want to ask for permission?”

Annabeth could be gone for days before her parents even noticed her absence. She wasn’t the kind of ten year old who needed permission to get ice cream with a total stranger. She looked back at the boy, her mortal enemy, and he flashed her that mischievous grin again- and maybe some part of her always knew he was nothing but trouble. Annabeth looked around one last time at the empty seats and figured she had no other plans.

“Okay.” She said. “I’m Annabeth, by the way.”

“Hi, Annabeth. I’m Sally,” The boy’s mom said. “And this here, is-”

“Percy Jackson.”

*

They began somewhere there- between the ice creams and the crushes and the kisses and the teen angst and the indecision. They began the way every great love story did- passionate and honest, but gradual and deliberate, too. It took effort to build a love like theirs- effort, and patience, and a closeness they could brag about the way only children who grew up together could.

Their history could not go ignored- Annabeth, of all people, knew the importance of a strong foundation. She liked to imagine their time as children as laying the groundwork for all that was to come. They’d created a home on that- built it with bricks and steel and cement and straw so when the wind blew and the cyclones hit, they fell with the comfort of knowing there was nothing in the would that could take the past away from them.

So they fought- _ of course _ they fought- and they argued and they were petty and catty and irritable. She was leaving and he was stressed- how could it not get to them? But they were Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase and for as long as they were there, they were  _ them-  _ nothing would hurt them.

“So when do you start?”

Percy’s tone was light but his words were weighted. Not  _ when do we move _ , no- when do  _ you _ start? Annabeth noticed- there wasn’t much that she didn’t- but in the moment it didn’t feel like a threat. He held her around the shoulders as they wandered aimlessly down the street outside Sally Jackson’s apartment. They were still full from her elaborate brunch. It was a familiar stroll.

“September.”

It was only just the very first days of summer, sweltering heat and streets crawling with tourists. Percy hated tourists- hated how slowly they walked and how they liked to stop in their tracks and randomly point in wonder at the sky. Annabeth was a little bit more patient. She found herself envying them sometimes, when they gathered around Times Square or took selfies with the Statue of Liberty. What was it like, she wondered, to experience New York City for the first time.

“We’ve still got time, then.” Percy said.

He pulled her into his chest and pressed his lips into her hair to distract her from what he might have meant. Time was running out- she supposed they both knew it- but neither of them were quite ready to consider what would happen after that. 

“You know what we should do,” If she’d had any idea at all, her smile might not have been so wide. “Go by BackStage. See if it’s still up there.”

“That’s like, seven blocks out of the way.” Percy whined. He looked down at Annabeth and she batted her eyes in her best effort to sway him. “Fine.”

The afternoon sun beat down on them and a cool breeze blew in her hair and the city was brand new. Maybe she  _ did _ see what tourists saw- a city full of opportunity and greatness and simplicity in its zigzagging roads and brick buildings. She was fortunate to have all of that and then some. These were the same roads Percy and she learned to drive on, pavements they’d broken bones on and apartments that rang with their laughter.

The BackStage Movie Company was one of New York’s few attractions that tourists and residents alike might choose to walk past. It was an old, somewhat pathetic-looking building with paint chipping off each letter. The defunct movie theatre was frayed from at least twenty years of neglect, but neither Percy nor Annabeth were looking at any of that.

On the side of what used to be the pale white wall, in a colour that used to be Krylon’s Athletic Field Blue, are the words  _ we’ll rule the world, now, and 4ever. watch this space. PJ+AC _ \- one half in neat cursive and the other in a messy block print. Annabeth ran her fingers over the cement, lingering over the  _ 4 _ .

Fifteen years old and invincible- the whole neighbourhood, the city, the country, the world- made for their taking. Had it changed when Sally married Paul and moved out? Was it when Annabeth and Percy moved into their apartment one year into college? Where did it go, she wanted to ask, tracing a crack that had started to form, cutting across the  _ + _ . Where were the people, the homes, the old cinema halls now? 

“It’s falling apart.” Percy said in a hushed whisper, looking up in awe at the building. “I can’t believe it.”

He was right. Everything was changing, and time carried on with no respect for the children with Manhattan in their lungs.

  
  


*

“New York isn’t going to be the same without you guys.” Silena Beauregard said on Percy’s birthday and Annabeth pretended she didn’t see the way his shoulders tensed.

The clock was ticking now- less than a month to go and there were still things they hadn’t talked about. There were still times she couldn’t look him in the eye. Luckily for her, she was saved- both, from coming up with an explanation, and watching Percy fumble through an excuse as to why he’s not sure when he’s leaving yet- from the twentieth call from work.

It was a little past midnight. Annabeth had an entire party planned, complete with a session at the karaoke bar for Percy’s twenty-fifth birthday and so far, she’d barely managed to get in the swing of things. Her boss was still getting used to a life without her, meaning she was constantly on call. Who do we go to to get our models done? Where are the blueprints for the Moats house? How much of the budget allowance can we spare to buy a new stapler? She’d spent a majority of the night outside on the street, talking her well-intentioned if not harebrained boss out of starting the entire project from scratch.

She hung up on Kirsten and found Percy waiting for her outside the bar. She shrugged her shoulders and pecked him on the cheek.

“Sorry about that.” She held her phone up. “It’s been crazy. Kirsten is even less ready for me to leave than I feel.”

Percy didn’t laugh with her. His frown deepened and he scowled. “Yeah. We all know how ready  _ you _ are to get out of here.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Annabeth hesitated and took a step away from him. Percy rolled his eyes.

“Don’t play dumb. You know  _ exactly _ what I mean.” He snapped. “You organised this whole party- and you’ve been MIA this entire time.”

“That’s not fair.” Annabeth let out a shaky breath. The summer night was cool against her lips. “I’ve got work to do, and-”

“ _ Of course _ you have to work. You’re not the only one with a job. It’s one fucking night, Annabeth. _ One _ night.” Percy lets out a frustrated growl. “You could have just said- that there’s other things you care about.”

If he hadn’t taken that tone with her; if it hadn’t been on a night that Kirsten had irritated her already; if it hadn’t been a culmination of months of not talking about what’s bothering them- Annabeth might have heard another question in his accusation.  _ Do you care about us at all _ ? But it just so happened to be today, the eighteenth night of August, and Annabeth felt the blood rush in her ears and her cheeks heat up with anger.

“I’m sorry!” She cried sarcastically, throwing her arms up in the air. “I am so  _ fucking _ sorry, Percy, that I have other priorities in my life right now. I’m sorry I can’t just walk away from work because you want to celebrate your birthday. You’ve had twenty five of those- maybe it’s time you grew up.”

The problem was never his birthday party- it was just easier to focus on. Somewhere inside the bar, all their friends- everybody they loved- was celebrating Percy. It seemed particularly cruel that the two people who might have enjoyed it the most excited were the ones standing outside with everything to lose.

“You know that’s not the problem here.” Percy said. The louder her voice got, the more his dropped. They stood in a dangerous limbo. She crossed her arms over her chest, feeling a little bit out of breath.

“Then what is.” It was less a question and more of a challenge. I  _ dare _ you to say it out loud.

For a moment, it looked like he was going to do it. He was going to break open that tight seal they’d both worked so hard to screw shut. Annabeth curled her hands into fists- she knew this was coming, she just wasn’t prepared for it. Percy’s eyes flashed with anger she’d never known him capable of, and she swallowed thickly.

“ _ You’re _ the one who made us this.” He said. “I don’t have to explain anything to you.”

Nothing he ever said would have hurt more. He could have socked her in the jaw and Annabeth would have reacted better to it. He thought they were arguing all the time because of  _ her _ . He thought  _ she _ was the reason they were struggling. The worst thing was that she  _ was _ . If she’d just never applied for this stupid job, they would never be here. One part of her wanted to fall to her knees and beg for forgiveness. She took something sturdy and pure and good and she created something horrible. They couldn’t get through one conversation and it was because of  _ her _ . She opened her mouth.

“ _ You’re _ the one who never booked a flight ticket.” She was taken aback by how cold she sounded. Her ribs shivered at the thought of losing him. A bigger person would apologise and try to work it out. “You were never going to come with me. Don’t put this on me-  _ no- _ you don’t get to point fingers when  _ you’re  _ the one who bailed.”

“I didn’t  _ bail _ .” Percy ran his hand through his hair. “I didn’t. You- You’re asking me to uproot my entire life to move to Greece with you. How am I not allowed a moment to think about it?”

“You  _ had _ a moment to think about it!” Annabeth cried. “You had plenty of moments! I applied for this job in  _ January _ . You were fine then. I got it in  _ June- _ and you didn’t seem to take it that hard. You’re just angry because you didn’t think I could do it.”

Percy was quiet for a moment. He stepped forward but he felt infinitely further away. “This is my entire life. How can I leave it behind?” 

_ You are my entire life _ , Annabeth wanted to tell him. She looked at Percy, who was obviously cut up over it, and she knew in her heart that they were doomed. They’d grown up together, two peas in a pod- but for all their similarities, she knew one thing to be true: Percy had a family he didn’t want to leave behind and Annabeth never had anybody who cared enough to ask where she was going.

“And how can I?” 

He had no answer. Her arms hung limply at her sides and they stared at each other. Maybe it was time to call it- but Annabeth didn’t have the strength to. She tried to imagine, for one second through the white hot pain of possibility- her turning on her heel and leaving without once looking over her shoulder. She tried to imagine spending the night in a home that wasn't theirs, in a bed with a man that wasn’t him. Her stomach churned and all her drinks of the night threatened to rise up her throat.

There  _ was _ no future without him. There couldn’t be. If she walked away tonight, she was walking into the arms of loneliness. She’d go her whole life knowing she’d never love anyone that could compare to what she held for him, and that is no life at all. She hesitated for a moment, just as his hands twitched as if he was reaching out to her and then thought better of it.

“I was never joking about the job.” She whispered.

“And I was never joking about not leaving New York.” He said.

She was an unstoppable force, untethered and powerful, designed to take over the world. He was an immovable object, a man of Manhattan herself, born from; born  _ for _ the greatness she had to offer. There was nothing left to do but wait.

*

One week before she left, they did the one thing Percy hated most in the world- they grabbed crêpes from the back of a van and sat among the tourists and pigeons and Bethesda fountain.

“Why does everyone love this stupid fountain so much?” Percy asked, scowling at a group of teenagers posing for a thousand photos a few feet away.

“It’s one of the most famous fountains in the world.” Annabeth said absently. “And you love coming here.”

“Yeah, but that’s different.” Percy grumbled. He took an angry bite of his crêpe. It was important for Annabeth to acknowledge that he was unhappy to be there. He pointed up ahead, just under the bridge. “You see that spot there?”

“Sure.”

“When I was nineteen yeard old, I asked the love of my life to move into an apartment with me- right there. That very spot.” He said, as if Annabeth didn’t know. “And over there?” He nodded over his shoulder at the lake. “That’s where I told her I loved her for the first time.”

Annabeth raised her brows. “Oh? How come I didn’t know about this?” 

Percy let out a laugh and rolled his eyes. “Point is- I have a reason to love this place, you know? What’s their excuse?” He looked to a family with a young child. “You think that kid knows the value of the tiles he’s stumbling over? The power this terrace holds?”

Annabeth played with his fingers. He was obviously bothered by this, bothered by the end of the New York Era of her life- but he couldn’t remind her enough to stay back. 

“That sculpture there-,” Annabeth pointed overhead to the fountain. “It’s called the Angel of the Waters, see- and the lady who designed it- she was the first woman to receive a commission for art in New York City. We’re sitting on a piece of history, eating crêpes and pointing at children- but I don't think any of us really remembers just how much power this terrace holds.”

Percy was quiet for a long time. “New York history should belong to New Yorkers.”

“What about the rest of the world?”

“It wouldn’t be Manhattan.”

  
  


* * *

There is a storm outside.

“This isn’t working.”

His voice is quiet, only just a whisper. On the other side of their walls, on the other side of their home, thunder shakes the Earth and lightning flashes, lighting up the entire universe beyond them. His words could have been swallowed in by them. His words  _ should _ have been drowned out.

Annabeth doesn’t know how to respond. She’s perched on the edge of her seat, checking her emails on her phone. Percy sits down beside her and refuses to meet her eye. She watches him, refusing to believe him, refusing still to hear him at all. His jaw is clenched and he swallows thickly, his gaze fixed firmly on the television in front of them.

“What?” She asks.

Anyone else might have felt rejection; loneliness, or embarrassment, or fear. Not Annabeth. Not when she was with him. She set her phone down slowly and reached out, tracing her fingers down his face until she could cup his cheek in her hand. His skin is warm, his stubble rough under her touch. His expression does not soften.

“This- we-  _ us _ .” He says into the room. He blinks and pulls away from her. “This is the end of the road.”

It’s the fighting, Annabeth thinks. She’s nervous about the distance and he is mourning their life together and this is something she should have seen coming. She takes a deep, shaky breath. One, two, and then another one. She loves Percy; loves him more than she’s ever loved anything in her entire life. He’s many things- but right now he is  _ wrong _ .

“You’re wrong.” She tells him gently. He isn’t used to fear. “This isn’t…the  _ end _ .”

“It is.” Percy insists through clenched teeth. “ _ Please _ . Let it be the end.”

Annabeth leaves in two days. She drops her hand and looks down at her fingers. This isn’t the end, she thinks again. It’s the beginning, it’s a new adventure, a new way of life.

“You aren’t serious.”

“I am. I can’t do this anymore. I don’t  _ want _ to do this anymore.” Percy’s voice breaks and his lower lip trembles and maybe that’s what Annabeth really needed for her to realise he wasn’t joking.

A chill runs down her spine and she recoils from him like he’d just burned her. He  _ had _ just burned her. She opens her mouth and then shuts it, looking desperately for any words at all. Percy refuses to look at her face, refuses to give in- even when she lets out a gasp for air because that is what it feels like to be faced with this truth; it feels like she is drowning.

Hot tears start to burn at her eyes and her disbelief is starting to turn into something heavy and ugly that she refuses to call heartbreak, because this is  _ not _ the end. Her chest begins to constrict and the room is starting to close in on her and on instinct, she reaches out for his hand, intertwining her fingers with his.

Percy remains so still, so completely void of any expression at all, he might as well have been made of stone. His hand is cold, offering her no comfort while the world around her collapses. He stays entirely silent, and maybe it’s a good thing he doesn’t say anything, because she doesn’t quite know what it is she’s looking for.

“Are you joking?” She asks with what little her mind is able to come up with. Please,  _ please _ be joking. Percy doesn’t look at her, but in the dim lights, his eyes shine with tears of his own and it makes this all the more difficult.

Their living room is starting to seem different. The flowers in the vase are wilted and the bookshelf is misaligned and Annabeth’s dress feels too tight and it feels like nothing in the entire universe can be beautiful again.

  
She leans forward again and searches his face and he tears his gaze away from the wall to meet her eye and she knows then that there’s no coming back from here. It doesn’t make sense to her; their relationship is nine years in the making, and they’d stuck together- through college and the fights and the jealousy and the careers. They cleared every hurdle that adolescence and young adulthood had thrown at them. It doesn’t make sense now, when they are meant to have settled into their life together- when the future is less a hazy notion of what  _ might _ be- for them to fall apart like this.

“You promised.” She says, her voice gravelly. “Anywhere I went, you  _ promised _ .” 

“I was sixteen years old.” He says and she knows he’s right.

Sixteen and in love and ready to risk the world for each other. They were so madly in love; envisioning a future together with nothing to their name. Nine years, Annabeth thinks. For nine years they’ve been like that- madly in love. She looks at her boyfriend's face and knows instinctively that they’ll always be like this.

“I won’t go.” She blurts. “What if I don’t go? I’ll stay. We- we can fix this.”

  
Who cares? Who cares about Greece and the Parthenon and Corinthian architecture? Who cares about refurbishment and stupid public funded projects and who cares that it’s the chance of a lifetime? What is sunlight, she wonders, for someone with no windows.

Percy shakes his head and his lips curve ever so slightly. He looks, for just a flash, like he might reach out to her, maybe tuck her hair behind her ear and kiss her on the cheek and tell her she’s going to be okay. Under her palm, his hand twitches, but he doesn’t move.

“This is your dream.”

Annabeth’s throat begins to close up. She shakes her head and desperately tries to blink back her tears.  _ No _ , she wants to tell him.  _ This isn’t my dream. If I could go back in time I would beg any god who’d listen for any other dream to have _ . This is all her fault- she’d been the silly girl who dreamed too big and now she has to pay the price.

“ _ You _ are my dream.”

That is the only thing that she knows for sure at this moment. How many nights had Annabeth lain awake in bed, listening to her parents arguing and praying for a brighter future for herself. How many times had she had her heart broken and begged the fates to grant her stability. How many times had she looked at the empty seat at the dining table that her mother left behind and yearned for a whole, present family for herself?

And Percy had been there- since they were ten years old and still too young to know what forever meant, he’d granted her everything she’d ever asked for. He’d stood by her side with no promises to break and he’d guided her through the darkest times with a smile on his face and he was her whole world.

Her world runs his thumb over her wrist tenderly and gives her an apologetic smile.

“Not if I keep you from this.”

She supposes they are both old enough to know it’s true. If she doesn’t go now, who’s to say she won’t resent him for it in the future? There is no real choice here- she’ll lose him now, or she might lose him later. Perhaps she’d read the signs wrong. Perhaps he never was hers to have.

Annabeth’s tears drop down her cheeks but she can barely feel them. She sits there for a beat, watching Percy’s chest rise and fall through his t-shirt. There is no right response, no correct way to handle this. She looks out of the window, the sound of rain against glass the only thing that keeps her grounded.

“Can I…” She swallows down the fire in her throat. “Can I stay the night?”

This is not their apartment anymore, this is not hers. Perhaps it would sting less if she hadn’t invested six years of her life trying to make it pretty, or if she could look at the photos on the walls and not be hit with nostalgia. Perhaps it would sting less if it wasn’t the first place she’d been able to call her home. She asks for permission- permission to spend the night in her own home, because she has nowhere else to go. Photos of her fill the picture frames and her awards line the shelves.  _ Please let me stay for one final night _ . Somewhere, there is a god laughing down at her.

Percy looks intently at the floor beneath them.

“Yeah. I’ll just… take the couch.”

_ No. Don’t. Please _ . He doesn’t wait for her to protest, doesn’t wait to find out if she’ll beg him to stay with her for one more night. She watches him, his t-shirt loose on his tight shoulders as he pads off into what will one day be the bedroom they shared. Annabeth follows Percy, because what else has she ever done.

The lights stay off, the room illuminated only by shadows that the streetlights cast on the ceiling. Annabeth leans against the doorframe as Percy rifles through his dresser, and watches him change into his pyjamas a little breathlessly. In any other world, she might have been able to cross the length of their room, hold him to her and press her cheek between his bare shoulder blades. In any other world, he might have let her love him like she wants to.

“I don’t know how to do this.” She says softly.

Percy pulls his t-shirt over his head painfully slowly, the muscles of his back stretching as he does. Even in the dark, she knows those muscles; knows their angles and their edges. Knows when they are relaxed and how they look when he’s worried. In the dark, she can almost feel them under her fingers. He shucks off his jeans and folds them over the dresser, and there is intent in the way he remains with his back to her and facing the window. She doesn’t realise until later that she’d crossed her fingers and held her breath, hoping beyond any logic or reason that he would take back his words.

“I think we just do.”

There is some irony, she supposes, that the last thing they do together is fall apart like this.

Percy ducks into their bathroom and it  _ hurts _ . It hurts to watch him move around, to continue to exist in a world where they are not  _ them _ anymore. He ducks into  _ their _ bathroom and she knows from the years of living with him that he is brushing his teeth and it feels wrong to be so close to someone so far away. 

She walks up to the bathroom door, her hand hovering over the handle, and she stops herself. She knows that she can’t join him in something as mundane as a nighttime routine, just as he can’t come back into bed with her. Already, their life is disintegrating and she’s not quite ready for it yet.

Annabeth paces up and down the room, hears the faucets turn on and off and can see him going through the motions in her mind. She tries to close her eyes, remove the image from her mind, tries to stop feeling the loss of nine years of her life; nine years of love and affection and friendship in this moment.

By the time he comes out, she’s crying again. Percy hands her the box of tissues that sits on her night stand and, without a word, walks around her. Annabeth blows her nose and there is no grace in the way she hiccups through her tears. What has she got left to lose? He has seen her every version of her. She can sense his presence behind her, his breath warm on her neck. His fingers trail down the bare skin of her back, between her shoulders and down her spine, and without any prompting, like he always has, he unzips her dress for her.

Annabeth doesn’t move- not when his hands linger, not when he brushes her hair over her shoulder, not when he doesn’t drop a kiss on her skin like he might have done before. She stays still as she can, trying to memorise the feeling of having him so close to her. His skin doesn’t touch her, but he’s close enough that it feels infinitely more significant like this.

And just like that, the moment is passed and Percy drops his hand and there is nothing left to say. He hesitates again, and Annabeth turns around to face him. She can only see a part of his face, and that is heartbreaking enough without knowing the way he looks at her. He searches her face, his gaze lingering for a moment too long on her lips. He wets his own lips and Annabeth’s fingers ache from wanting to reach out and tangle them in his hair.

“We’ll be friends, though.” Percy says, like he’s trying to convince himself. “You’ll… you’ll still be my best friend.”

There is no way to say it to him. There is no way to say to him that she will never be able to look into those brilliant eyes again. She’ll leave this apartment tomorrow and she’ll leave New York City two days after that- and she doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to come back, not if it’s not to him.

Annabeth doesn’t claim to be able to see the future, but she knows for certain that there is no chance at all of a future without Percy in Manhattan. Years can pass and the street under their apartment will still feel like a stab wound to the heart, the twinkling lights of a city that never sleeps will be a constant reminder of what she’s lost. Percy Jackson  _ is _ her New York- she doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to set foot in here again.

“Sure.”

“You will not believe this.”

Annabeth doesn’t look up from her glass. She’s careful in measuring out her mimosa- the trick is to have all champagne with a single drop of orange juice to give it a citrusy twist. She swirls her drink carefully so she doesn’t lose any of it to gravity and takes a long sip before turning her attention to Clarisse.

“What?”

“Neon Classic is having a secret session.  _ Tonight _ .”

Annabeth narrows her eyes at her best friend. It seems altogether  _ too _ convenient that Neon Classic is organising a secret gig, the same night that she got kicked out of her own apartment by the love of her life. She takes another long sip of her mimosa. Clarisse’s smile is so wide it threatens to rip her face in half and she tosses her phone to Annabeth from her place on the couch. Annabeth blinks at the screen, but Clarisse, she realises, is right.

“Tonight? Like-  _ tonight _ tonight?”

She feels a surge of energy, a hint of an emotion- something that  _ doesn’t  _ leave her numb and looking to drown her sorrows in a bottle while listening to her saddest playlist on repeat- and feels a smile coming on. Neon Classic was the single greatest underground exclusive music festival in all of New York City and a personal favourite of Annabeth’s. She, Silena and Clarisse had been sneaking in since college, before any of them were legally allowed to be there. The music is incredible, the drinks fantastic and the atmosphere designed for the immortal youth.

  
Between Clarisse and Percy, who both worked for music magazines and record labels, Annabeth had always,  _ always _ been able to make them. It is perhaps the only memory she had in New York that wasn’t exclusively tied to Percy. It feels like fate that her last night in the country falls on the day of a Neon Classic.

“We’re going.” Annabeth decides and Clarisse lets out a  _ whoop _ !

“ _ Fuck _ yeah, we are. I’m emailing work right now to get us those passes. This is going to be the single greatest night of our lives!”

_ Yeah _ , Annabeth thinks to herself. She downs the entirety of her third mimosa and pours herself another. That is  _ exactly _ what she needs. A good night out in a city that she loves with the people that she loves. One night to help her reset the hurt and pain.

“What’s going to be the greatest night of our lives?” 

Silena comes out of her room just then, impeccably dressed and her hair neatly set and the exact opposite of how Annabeth imagines she looks right now. She hasn’t really had the chance to look in the mirror, lately. Silena studies her and wrinkles her nose.

“How many down are you?” She asks and Clarisse rolls her eyes, grabbing one of Silena’s purposefully positioned cushions on the couch and tossing it at her. Silena ducks and the couch lands softly on the ground.

“Let her have this.” Clarisse says. “She’s going through a pretty horrific b-r-e-a-k-u-p.”

“I know, but this,” Silena gestures to Annabeth’s mimosa with a frown. “Doesn’t seem healthy. She should talk about her feelings, Clarisse. You know. Like adults do?”

“ _ Or _ she could get drunk off her tits, go out into the world and realise just how many people would kill for a shot at her, forget her entire relationship and move on. You know. Like normal human beings do.”

  
Silena glares at her. “You know, I think that she-”

“She can hear you, you know?” Annabeth interrupts. She’s almost too familiar with this song and dance. She would like to skip over the part where Clarisse threatens Silena and Silena tells Clarisse her hair is dry. “And spell.” She adds with a pointed look at Clarisse, who shrugs.

“Anyway. We’re going tonight.” Annabeth decides. Silena opens her mouth to protest, but she cuts her off. “I’ve got a bottle of tequila and one final night with my best friends and I can’t-”

Annabeth’s voice breaks, and for one horrible second it seems like she might break down. She stares at the ground next to where Silena stands, focusing on her breath. She  _ won’t _ cry. Not now; not today. Behind her, music plays softly on the speaker, a song about love that sets you on fire. She focuses on the words, a hazy memory of Percy holding her hand in his and twirling her ungracefully around their then new, empty apartment. He’d stepped on her toes and stumbled over the carpet and held her to his chest where she could feel his laughter rumble and they had been so excited.

They’d fallen so foolishly, so freely in love that night, in a cramped apartment on Albatross Way. His hand on her back and his feet between hers and his lips that lingered on her cheekbones. His hair was still damp from a shower and his shorts were the last clean pair because their washer hadn’t been installed yet. One year into college, the entirety of the yellow brick road extended ahead of them. 

The more she listens to the words, the more intense the song becomes, and the less she thinks of it. Percy and she are in love. They are in love and they are whole and true; but love has never felt like being set aflame. Her love for Percy is- was, and always will be- a cool balm on the scars that the end left on her skin. How could she ever resent him for being her dream come true, even if only for a while?

It’s such a  _ real _ memory, how happy they were, how gentle their love had been. She drops her hand to her stomach, expecting to feel his palm spread over her abdomen. She can smell his soap and hear his breath, and is taken by surprise when she realises he isn’t here with her in Clarisse and Silena’s apartment. She starts slightly, pulled back into the present. Silena worries her lip, and even Clarisse has gotten up from the couch and looks a little concerned. Neither of them say anything to her, and she’s grateful for their silence. Annabeth clears her throat.

“I can’t leave New York like this.”

She can’t look at this city as it is again. She can’t look at  _ her _ city, a city with walls that she’d painted on and streets she’d fallen in love on and apartments she’d begun her life in; a city that had stuck with her through all the heartbreaks of her childhood, where she’d lost everything she loved and met all her favourite people. She’d grown up here, within Manhattan’s warm embrace, because that’s what the island is, for Annabeth- she is one of New York’s own, and in return, the city keeps her safe.

And now the magic is gone and the colours are starting to fade and she’s already lost too much for her to have to give up the city, too. This  _ can’t _ be how it ends. She shakes her head.

“I- I  _ can’t _ leave like this.” She repeats. “I can’t- look at the skyline, or the streets or pop into a bodega to pick up some bubbly.” She holds up her empty bottle to show them. “It hurts too much. How am I expected to do this?”

Silena reaches her first, and Annabeth feels her best friend’s arms around her shoulders. She waits for the waterworks, waits to feel miserable and cry, but it never comes. There are no emotions in the world that would accurately describe what Annabeth is going through. She doesn’t feel anger, or grief, or even disbelief.

Annabeth woke up this morning and walked out of her own home, past her boyfriend sleeping on their couch (although she suspects he was only pretending to avoid looking at her) and an important chapter in her life closed behind her. She went directly to Clarisse and Silena’s, where Clarisse already had her first mimosa waiting for her, and she’s been here, like this, for hours. There is nothing to be said, nothing to be done anymore.

It hurts her a great deal to linger on her relationship, and it hurts a great deal more to pretend it never happened. Time ticks on by and there is no way for her to understand what it is she’s feeling.

“Fine.” Silena says, pressing a kiss to the top of Annabeth’s head. “Clarisse will get us tickets. I’ll take the day off. We’re going to Neon Classic.”

  
  


*

“What time did you say your flight was at, again?” Silena asks.

She’s curled up in her bean bag chair in the corner of her room, half buried under the thousands of dresses, skirts and blouses the three of them had spent the last hour trying on before rejecting. She takes a long swig from her bottle of cheap rosé.

“Nine in the morning.” Annabeth groans into Silena’s bed.

Somewhere in the living room, she has two neatly packed suitcases with everything she’s going to take with her to Greece. All her other possessions are still at Albatross Way- her lava lamp and her favourite throw pillow. One day- if not right now- they will sit on the edge of the sidewalk or on a charity shop shelf. One day, everything she owned will be Percy Jackson’s trash. Her heart twists painfully. She stirs her vodka cranberry with a straw and sips on it before burying her face in a pillow.

“Tonight seems irresponsible.” Silena’s voice is far away. Clarisse swivels around in her chair and kicks Silena gently in the hip.

“That’s kind of the best part.”

“Maybe if we were twenty. We’re getting older now.”

“Stop being so boring.” Clarisse says. Then she sucks in a breath and Annabeth pushes herself up off the pillow to squint at her. Clarisse’s eyes are widened and a devilish grin is starting to grow on her lips. “You know what we  _ should _ do,” she says. Annabeth shakes her head. “Pay our friend Travis a visit while we wait.”

“Not Travis Stoll.” Silena says, but Clarisse nods her head. 

“Yes, Travis Stoll. Travis with the good weed Stoll.”

“We can barely afford his weed.” Silena protests and Clarisse raises her eyebrows.

“And why not? We’ve all got decent jobs, we can afford a little… puff puff.” She pretends to smoke a joint. “And Annabeth’s going to be gone tomorrow and New York sure as  _ fuck _ isn’t going to be the same. Come on, it’ll be a fun day!”

Annabeth can’t remember the last time she’d spent a day with the girls- drunk and high and with no responsibilities. It’ll be good for her, she thinks. Like her days in college. A pleasant memory of New York for her to take with her to Athens. Silena looks doubtful, her gaze flitting between her two friends and her eyes narrowed.

“She’s right.” Annabeth tries. “We could get some kush and go shopping for something to wear for the evening considering we haven’t found anything in this mess.” She holds up the skimpy lace top lying closest to her as evidence. Silena considers it.

“Fine.” She sighs and pushes the pile of clothes off of herself as she gets to her feet. “Let’s go see Creepy Travis.”

“Yes!” Clarisse jumps to her feet and reaches over to Annabeth, shoving her forcefully off the edge of the bed and onto the floor. Annabeth groans as she gets up and flips Clarisse off, but she doesn’t let that bother her. “Oh, Annabeth. You’re going to have to change.”

Annabeth looks down at the joggers and old Columbia t-shirt she has on and frowns. “What, suddenly this isn’t good enough for you guys?”

“That has  _ never  _ been good enough for us.” Silena says. “Also Clarisse is right. Didn’t Travis have like, the biggest crush on you? Maybe if we tell him you’re single he’ll give us an old college hook-up discount.”

Annabeth rolls her eyes but she doesn’t protest when Silena tosses her a pair of jeans and a black top from the mess on her floor. She could do with some pretty clothes.

By the time the three of them make it out, they’re all sufficiently drunk and somewhat hungry. They stop by Bob’s Bistro for brunch- a little bit to fill their stomachs and a little bit for a fresh bloody mary. Annabeth focuses entirely on her avocado toast and is only halfway through it when she hears Clarisse make a strangled sound. She looks up to see Clarisse watching something straight ahead of her, presumably at the entrance to the cafe.

“What?” Annabeth asks. She takes a long, leisurely sip of her drink.

“Okay, Annabeth. Don’t freak,” Clarisse says slowly just as Silena cusses under her breath. 

Annabeth doesn’t like the expressions on their faces and her heart slams against her chest- it might have been from anticipation or just the fact that she’s on her eighth drink before noon, she doesn’t know.

“It’s Luke.” Silena fills in quietly.

“What do you mean, Luke.” Annabeth asks, fighting every muscle in her body to not turn around instantly. “Luke who broke my heart Luke?  _ That _ Luke?”

Silena nods her head a hundred times a minute, her eyes growing wider and wider as she followed him around. “He just saw us. He’s coming over.”

“Luke as in Luke Castellan?” Annabeth asks in a panic. Is her hair alright? God, she hasn’t seen Luke since they graduated college. “Luke, like-?”

“Luke, like Luke who’s here!” Clarisse cuts her off loudly. Annabeth feels a presence behind her and looks over her shoulder to see a familiar figure. Broad shoulders and tousled hair and a fashionably styled stubble on his jaw. His face splits into a grin and he winks at her.

“I can’t believe it.” He says. “Haven’t seen you girls in a while. How are you doing, Annabeth?”

“Great, yeah, thanks.” Annabeth manages. “Funny running into you here.”

Luke bounces from one foot to another. “Yeah, I’ve got a meeting to attend. I work for the guys who organise Neon Classic, so it’s kind of a pretty big day for me. I assume I’ll see you three there tonight?”

“Yeah, we’re just starting early.” Silena says with a tight smile, holding up her glass to show him. Luke gives Annabeth a knowing look like they’re sharing some secret.

“So great running into you.” He says. “I gotta bounce, but if you need any help getting in tonight- I’m in charge of the guestlist and admission passes so just, like, drop me a text.”

“Clarisse actually works for Rolling Stone, so we won’t need your help.” Silena says matter-of-factly. “But thanks for the offer.”

Luke looks between the three of them and Annabeth imagines it’s an awkward place for him to be- with Annabeth looking up at him in a daze, Clarisse glaring at him and Silena being so passive aggressive. He gives them a final nod.

“Anyway. I’m off.” He announces. “Silena, pleasure as always. Clarisse- you still hate me, that’s cool. And… Annabeth.” He hesitates. “You look good.”

Annabeth watches him walk off and slide into a booth with other men dressed like him- crisp suits and polished shoes. Then she turns back to her friends.

“Please tell me I’m not the only one thinking it…” She says. Silena nods.

“No, he’s definitely gotten better looking.”

“I didn’t think it was possible.” Annabeth laughs.

“I don’t see it.” Clarisse says. “I never have, actually. Thank god for lesbians.”

“Oh,  _ really _ ?” Silena asks sarcastically. “You’re into girls? Does your girlfriend know?”

“She isn’t my girlfriend.” Clarisse protests. “We just- hang out.”

“And have sex and kiss and go on dates.” Silena points out. Clarisse glares at her.

“You’re just jealous because you haven’t had a guy take you out on a date in the last forty years.”

Silena sticks her tongue out at Clarisse and blows a raspberry. It’s a pathetic response.

There is no real reason Annabeth finds it funny, but she bursts out laughing. There are things she’ll miss, when she starts her new life. Moments like these, crowded into a table with her two best friends, day drinking and embarrassingly in splits. Some part of her, more philosophical, she supposes than the rest of her, wants to dwell on what it means to be like she is now- to be swept away in the current and still be under the light of the sun. Her chest is tight but her heart is full and she thinks maybe the only way to survive the gaping hole of a love lost is to fill it with more.

Outside, the weather is kind of perfect. Cool enough that her jacket doesn’t roast her and cloudy so the sun won’t burn her. It feels like some kind of cosmic joke that the universe is playing on her, New York City and Percy’s favourite weather on her last day here. Clarisse falls into step with her while Silena trails behind them, texting her work furiously on her phone.

“How are you holding up?” Clarisse asks.

Annabeth knows Clarisse isn’t really one to confront any kind of feelings head-on. They’d gone two weeks without talking to each other in school once because Annabeth refused to go as the vinegar to Clarisse and Silena’s ketchup and mustard Halloween costumes. (Vinegar is simply  _ not _ a condiment and Annabeth will stand by that.) She thinks it’s nice of Clarisse to check in on her, especially knowing how uncomfortable it made her. 

No response comes to mind immediately. She looks up at the brick buildings that they walk by, at the balconies lined with potted plants and the crowds gathered around the kebab shops. This is New York, she thinks, with a pang of nostalgia. She misses the city already. They take their time walking to Travis Stoll’s apartment- Annabeth feels no guilt whatsoever in letting him wait. Back in college, Travis, who’d been their only hookup, would turn up hours late with a bag of pot and a wicked grin. It doesn’t feel unfair to return the favour.

“I’m okay.” Annabeth decides finally, when they turn the corner to the Stoll apartment.

Clarisse studies her. “Okay.” She says. She holds her arms out and then readjusts Annabeth’s bra and top. “We need these puppies out if we want to charm Travis into giving us more grass for less.”

“ _ Clarisse _ .” Annabeth swats her hand away but checks her reflection on the glass door anyway.

“Worth a shot.” Clarisse shrugs.

Silena catches up to them by the time they reach the elevator. “Sorry about that. I have to get back to the boutique for a second. Can we swing by once we’re done here?”

“Of course.” Annabeth says. “We were going to go by to get us some clothes for the evening anyway.”

Silena flashes her a smile and Annabeth tries to take a mental snapshot of her. One day she’ll be old and grey and today will fade into the past and she’ll only ever be able to tell her children just how beautiful, how full of life and how genuine their aunty Silena was. They’ll ask why they never visit her in her home and she might never have the strength to admit that their mother can’t set foot in New York City ever again, and it’s because somewhere in the city, there is a broken boy who’d broken her to pieces.

It takes Travis half a second to get the door and when he sees them, he beams and holds his arms open.

“If it isn’t my  _ ex- _ most loyal customers!” He gives Clarisse and Silena a big hug before moving on to Annabeth. “And how’s the boyfriend?” He asks her. She’s tucked so close into his chest, she can hear his heartbeat.

Annabeth doesn’t say anything, because she’s still not quite strong enough to speak those words out into the open yet. There’s a very distinct comfort in the arms of an old friend. He smells like the best kind of weed in the market and feels like skin and bone, but his presence is familiar. It’s a gentle nod to Annabeth’s life in New York. She can feel Travis gesturing to her friends over her head, but she ignores them, relishing the warmth of his body for just a moment longer.

“Annabeth and Percy broke up last night.” Clarisse says out loud, when the silence stretches on for too long and it’s apparent Travis doesn’t get the hint.

“Oh, Annabeth- I’m so sorry.” He says, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Poor, sad Annabeth. Come on in.”

He keeps his arm over her shoulders and leads them into his flat. It hasn’t changed much since the last time she was here, except it seems like he’s developed an even flashier lifestyle. Expensive shoes are lined up on his rack and an ornate crystal centerpiece sits on his table, and Annabeth wishes she’d just gotten into his line of business instead. Imagine the dresses, the shoes, the life she’d have had- imagine, for just one second, that she would have been perfectly content here, in New York like Travis is. Imagine a life where she’s a drug dealer and she could have still had Percy. 

“You guys got plans for the night?” Travis asks as Clarisse and Silena make themselves comfortable on his couch. He lets Annabeth go before settling in on the loveseat.

“Neon Classic.” Silena says. “It’s been a minute since we went.”

“Oh, god I’m jealous.” Travis says. “Where are you guys getting your passes from?”

“Clarisse.” Silena tells him by way of explanation. Travis nods like this makes complete sense to him.

“Important woman to know, aren’t you, Clarisse?” Travis asks and Clarisse smirks.

“Might say the same thing about you.” She says lightly.

Travis chats to them a while longer, a little bit about his brother who’s moved to Argentina and a little bit about his own business (it’s booming). Finally, when Clarisse gets a call from work and excuses herself, he is reminded of why they are there in the first place. He gets up off his seat and returns after a while with two  _ perfectly _ rolled blunts. Annabeth stares at them. Is it possible to be sexually attracted to a joint that was rolled this well? Travis winks at her and drops them in her hands.

“Don’t worry about it.” He says when Silena reaches into her pocket. Silena opens her mouth to protest, but Travis shrugs it off. “You girls kept me afloat through college. This is the least I can do- besides, Annabeth’s cat died, or whatever. Take it as my condolences.”

Annabeth knows he’s only trying to soften the blow, but  _ condolences _ still stings to hear. She’d forgotten about her breaking heart, for one glorious moment. She’d let herself get swept up in the nostalgia of their college days, nights when Travis would come over with a bong and the best weed their part-time minimum-wage jobs would allow and the girls- with Travis and Percy- would spend hours upon hours eating their way through the kitchen and giggling over idiotic revelations.

Annabeth watches her own fingers as they wrap around the joints. There’s just something about a blunt, she thinks. It’s been a while, but she knows- when she holds it between her lips and inhales it in, her lungs will fill themselves with tranquility and the harsh light and sharp edges of the world will soften.  _ Easy on the exhale _ , Percy likes to say.  _ The exhale is the best part _ . He’s right, of course. There’s not many things Annabeth has been able to disagree with him on.

It makes sense that he enjoys the exhale- she’s seen the way he watches the smoke through lidded eyes, lazy smile on his lips. She supposes it makes him feel a certain sense of peace- the exhale is what you have most control over. The exhale is the part that you can watch. The exhale is a frozen moment in time.

It’s unfair that she won’t see that anymore. Unfair that, without her permission, time  _ took _ that from her- took the look on his face when it finally hits, the way he’d lean back into the couch and cross his arms under his head and stare up at the ceiling for a minute before quoting poetry at her. Annabeth wishes she’d known the last time they smoked a joint together was the last time they’d ever do it together.

Her gut churns uncomfortably and she doesn’t wait to leave Travis’ penthouse. Carefully, she balances a blunt between her lips and picks Travis’ lighter off the tea table. She knows her friends are watching her, but her focus is entirely on the spiff in her mouth. She watches it get lit up, watches as the first fumes of smoke rise off from where the lighter met the joint. She sucks a deep breath in and imagines those fumes traveling through her mouth, down her throat and into her lungs. She lets it fill her slowly, one long inhale at a time, picturing it seep into her blood, her mind, her overworked heart.

“Thank you.” She says finally, when she feels like she can close her eyes without feeling awful again. She offers it to Travis, and for the first time since she met him, he turns her down.

“That’s for you.” He tells her kindly. Silena feels no qualms about plucking it out of Annabeth’s grasp and taking a drag. “If you want anything stronger, I’ve got some E, some LSD, maybe some MD... any letter of the alphabet, really. You name it, I got it. But  _ your _ boyfriend didn’t dump you, so you’re paying for  _ that _ stuff.” He tells Silena, who politely declines his offers.

Silena and Travis chat for a moment longer and then, suddenly, it’s time to leave. Annabeth lets Travis lead them back to his front door and just like that, they’re saying their goodbyes. It hits her for the first time, really, that this might be it- that they might very well be saying goodbye to never see each other again. Her lungs are free but her throat feels rough. She isn’t ready- not yet- to leave any part of this life behind. It’s too sudden. 

Travis pulls her in for a hug and kisses the top of her head one more time and she’s embarrassed that she holds on just a little bit tighter than she should.

“Now, you be good.” He whispers in her ear. “Europe is going to be different. Promise me to really  _ live _ when you’re there.”

  
Annabeth nods, unable to find any words to say, and Travis gives her a final kiss on the cheek before sending them on their way. They ride the elevator in silence, and Annabeth takes another long, slow drag on the spliff. Silena must sense that she’s a little off her game, because she slips her hand into Annabeth’s. It’s a small gesture- but it’s also the kind of support Annabeth thinks she really needs right now.

* 

They catch up to Clarisse outside the building, just as she’s hanging up the phone. She turns around when she hears them join her and lets out a frustrated grunt.

“So. That was work.” She says, and Annabeth’s stomach drops to her toes. It’s selfish, she knows, but she really doesn’t want Clarisse to have to bail on them. Apart from the fact that they’re drunk and fairly high and would make  _ terrible _ employees in this state, she also doesn’t want this day to end. “I couldn’t get the passes. Looks like the list is extra tight this year.”

Clarisse’s news isn’t quite as bad as her having to go to work, but it’s a close second. Annabeth feels hot tears starting to form in her eyes, and spoiled as she may sound, she wishes  _ one thing  _ would just go her way today. Silena squeezes her hand and clears her throat as Clarisse passes Annabeth the blunt.

“That’s okay.” She says when Annabeth takes another long drag. Easy on the exhale. She watches smoke puff out into the New York air. “You know what we have to do.”

“No.” Annabeth says. “We do not.”

Silena looks at her like she’s saying  _ come  _ on _ , Annabeth _ . “We bite the bullet. Someone has to text Luke.”

“Not it.” Clarisse says at the same time Silena says,

“Someone who  _ isn’t _ me.”

One beat passes and Annabeth realises why they’re both looking at her expectantly. She groans.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Please?” Silena asks, blinking her large eyes at Annabeth, who pushes her away.

“ _ Fine _ .”

She texts Luke and tries to ignore the undoubtedly smug tone in his immediate response to her. He asks for her to go collect it and the girls agree on splitting up- Clarisse and Silena can go back to the boutique so Silena can check her samples, and Annabeth would just meet them there. Within minutes, she has tearfully parted with her blunt and is sitting in the back of a taxi, zig-zagging her way through New York City.

She leans her head against the window and watches the streets pass her by. If she tries hard enough, she can see another version of herself, a version who’d chosen Percy, walking down these streets. A version of herself who’ll hold his hand and pull him into every shop with a cute dress on a mannequin and talk his ear off while they grab tacos from the back of a food truck together. A version of herself who’ll jaywalk and get in arguments with bad drivers and grow old right here, on these streets, with the love of her life. If she tries hard enough, she can see that, too- can see Percy getting down on one knee in Harlem and them getting married in the Village. They’ll buy a home and she’ll tell him one day that their family will grow and in one of the apartments that sits above a busy street, he will pick her up and twirl her around. And just like that, one day they’ll send their baby off to school and school will become college and soon they’ll welcome a grandchild into the world and eventually, just as quickly as it began, it will end, and Annabeth will be laid to rest beside Percy.

Annabeth looks out of the window and she sees her past and she sees her future- it’s just a shame she can’t see the present.

Luke is waiting outside his office building for her and is kind enough to pay for her cab ride. He holds his hand out to lead her in, but she keeps her arms firmly by her sides. It’s still too fresh- her palms are still raw without Percy’s pressed against them. It’s too soon to be letting Luke so close to her. He drops it and swipes them both in and takes her to a large office with glass walls. It’s neat and organised- much like Luke is- and she catches sight of a sports jacket and slacks hanging over one of his chairs. He follows her gaze and grins.

“Obviously can’t make it to Neon Classic looking like this.” He says, gesturing to his clothes. Annabeth shrugs and Luke rifles through the papers on his desk. “Just give me a second.”

“Take your time.” Annabeth says.

She walks around the office, her eyes picking up on every little detail they can manage, savoring each little secret she knows about Luke that he didn’t tell her himself. There’s a picture of her on his bookshelf. It’s so small, it’s barely noticeable- from when they were fourteen years old. She had been so madly in love with him back then, you can tell by the way she’s looking at him in the picture. It’s an odd choice, she thinks- for him to keep it here in his place of work.

“Percy took this photo.” She says.

Once his name is out in the open, her muscles are on autopilot. She picks up the photoframe and stares at it. Fifteen year old Luke, his arm around Annabeth and his face split into a wide grin. He’s mid-laugh, and is looking right at the camera like they’re sharing some inside joke. Annabeth was fourteen and she looked at him like he was made of pure stardust. On the other end of the office, Luke, now twenty-six and made of bone and blood, hums.

“It’s a nice photo.” He doesn’t pay her much mind.

But then again, he never did. In some long-winded way, Annabeth thinks it’s his fault that she’s suffering the way she is right now. It’s always easier to blame the boy who couldn’t love you when he should have.

Maybe if Luke had loved her when she loved him, she’d never have been at Katie Gardener’s party. He’d been her friend, she thinks wistfully. They had been close, and she was foolish enough to think that counted as love. She’d been young, so young- so when she told him, he’d iced her out. If he hadn’t iced her out, she’d never have kissed Percy at all. 

“I never apologised for what I did.” Luke says. Annabeth looks up at him distractedly and he shrugs his shoulders. “I never should have ignored you like that. I never should have told you I loved you.”

Annabeth had almost forgotten that happened. He’d come to her college dorm on a rainy day, breathless and soaking wet. He’d just got back from a gap year in Brazil- he promised he knew she and Percy were together, he just couldn’t live with himself if he never confessed his feelings to her. He’d made some bold statements- about never being able to forget her, hard as he tried, and him knowing he missed his chance. She vaguely recalls a promise to wait, no matter how long, if that’s what she had wanted. 

It was a nice gesture, she supposed, if not terribly mistimed. She was happy with Percy, and maybe her time with him had shown her what she felt for Luke was never love at all. She wonders if her definition of love would be different today if Luke hadn’t waited two years to come after her. She wonders if he’d be the one shattering her heart into a million pieces right now.

“If you had loved me the way I loved you,” Annabeth starts softly. Luke’s gaze stays steadily on her. She runs her thumb over the frame and feels a kindness toward the young girl in the photo.  _ I might have never learned what heartbreak feels like _ .

“We just missed each other, didn’t we?” Luke asks.

By the time he was ready to look at her like she had wanted, Percy had already taken her hand in his. He’d kissed her knuckles and stitched up her wounds and he’d  _ seen _ her. He is the first person in the entire universe to see her. By the time Luke came around, he’d already faded out her world. As if Annabeth had cared at all when he bought her those roses. As if she had space in her heart for anybody apart from Percy Jackson by then. She shakes her head.

“I didn’t miss you at all.”

Luke studies her when she replaces the photo and walks over to his desk. Three passes sit loosely between his fingers, and he barely reacts when she plucks them out. He stands perfectly still as she stores them safely in her purse.

“Annabeth,” He sounds desperate. She looks up at him and he watches her with intelligent blue eyes and tension in his brow. “I heard about Percy, and I’m-” he catches himself and swallows thickly, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I’m sorry. Really.”

The hardest part of the break up, she decides, is the fucking  _ pity _ . The sympathy and the sad looks. She gives him a quick hug.

“Thanks.” She says. “For the passes.”

*

“It was  _ teal _ .” Silena complains when Annabeth walks into her shop. “I asked for  _ aquamarine _ .”

“But it’s been sorted out.” Lacy says from behind the counter, flashing Annabeth a wide smile and a thumbs up. Silena scowls at her.

“Yeah, but I think we should drop them anyway.”

“It’s your call, boss.” Lacy puts her hands up in surrender and Silena rolls her eyes. Lacy laughs. “Hey, Annabeth. Is this your one last attempt to loot us before you leave?”

Annabeth laughs and leans against the counter. Lacy reaches under the desk and pulls out a pack of cigarettes and offers Annabeth one. It’s custom- Silena stresses at work and Lacy and Annabeth share a smoke- has been for years, ever since Silena started this place. Today is different. Today is  _ final _ . Annabeth shakes her head and Lacy shrugs her shoulders before slipping the box back into the drawer.

“So.” Lacy leans on her elbows and looks between Silena and Annabeth. “Neon Classic. When was the last time you went?”

“January.” Silena says without missing a beat. “Remember that? Tyga headlined and Percy got really drunk off of that Sambuca-”

The name slips out of her before she can help it and she stops, letting it hang in the air between them. Annabeth is pulled back to that night without her permission- sweaty bodies dancing altogether too close to them and Percy’s drink sloshing down the front of her dress. He’d apologised to her through dunken laughter and scooped her up easily and stumbled out of the party with Annabeth over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry.

That night he’d danced with her on the way home, twirling her on the street corners and dipping her outside the Seven-Eleven. He’d pressed kisses into her neck and climbed onto her back and sent them both tumbling to the ground. Annabeth’s knees still bear the scars- somehow they ache more now. She looks between Lacy and Silena.

“You got anything in red?”

*

There is something about curling her hair on the floor of Silena’s bedroom. Their favourite music from college blares on her Bluetooth speakers and Clarisse sings off-key and confidently as she curls her lashes. Annabeth has been in this exact position more times than she can count- curling iron dangerously close to burning her fingertips off and her best friends trying on three thousand outfits and hating all of them behind her.

At any moment, Percy would knock on the door-  _ their _ door, to  _ their _ bedroom- and ask how much longer they were going to take. He’d grunt when Annabeth said it would be a while and Silena would laugh and Clarisse would tell him to get over himself. He’d go hang out with Silena’s date and they’d complain about girls having no respect for his time. And then, when she came out of the room, Percy’d roll his eyes and hurry her out the door, and when they had a moment alone, he’d whisper how beautiful he thought she was in her ear.

Annabeth looks, on instinct, at the door- it lays wide open because there are no boys to keep out- and she can’t quite place the emotion that washes over her.

“You know what you should do,” Silena says, tossing a lip gloss at Annabeth’s head. It bounces off her shoulder and falls into her lap.

“Don’t throw things at me.” Annabeth warns, careful not to move. Her hair is twisted around a scalding hot iron and she isn’t particularly keen on burning her face because Silena was pelting makeup at her. “If I have to move to Greece with a hair curler burn on my chin, I’ll never forgive you.”

“Whatever.” She can almost hear Silena roll her eyes. “I think you should wear my green heels.”

“I’d look like a Christmas tree. Nobody  _ ever _ pairs red with green.” Annabeth says. Clarisse snorts.

“I can’t believe you’re moving away.” Clarisse says. She pours out another glass of rum and Coke on Silena’s dresser. “I’m actually going to miss your whiny ass on evenings like these.”

“I’ll be on FaceTime.” Annabeth says. “ _ You _ don’t have any problems with long distance, do you?”

Clarisse laughs and tops up Annabeth’s wine glass for her. An unusual act of kindness. “No.”

“Annabeth isn’t  _ dying _ , you know.” Silena says. “Plus, we can go see her. Clarisse can even bring her girlfriend. It’ll be our own little family holiday.”

“She’s  _ not _ my girlfriend.” Clarisse says through gritted teeth. Silena isn’t fazed.

“I never said who.” 

“Shut up, Beauregard.”

“Whatever. Annabeth,” Silena says. “Clarisse, Thalia and I will all see you in Greece. Girls’ trip.”

Annabeth thinks about the life she’s leaving behind. New York City is Percy- of course it is- but it’s also Clarisse and her ridiculous commitment issues, and Silena with her questionable fashion choices. For so long, Annabeth had been desperate for a family, for a group of people she could count on, something she could define herself by. The girl in the mirror is a little adamant like Clarisse and bossy like Silena and petty like Percy. She is headstrong and opinionated and stands up for what she believes in. She takes a moment to appreciate just how far she’s come from the ten year old child with nobody in the stands.

“Am I the only one who wants to light that blunt up again?” She asks as she changes sides. Her neck hurts from the effort it takes her to curl all her hair.

“See? We’re always going to be on the same wavelength, Sweets.” Silena winks at her through the mirror and extracts the half-smoked blunt. She takes a long puff. “There’s no way a few thousand miles is getting in the way of that.”

It’s easy for a moment, to let herself believe that- that if her job were any closer, maybe life wouldn’t have changed so much. She gets ready and poses for all the million selfies Silena wants to take, but realises with a guilty knot in her stomach that she barely recognises the young women beaming up at the camera. Their friendship is strong, true and pure as ever- you can tell just by how easily they stand with each other, how natural Silena’s arm is around Annabeth’s shoulders and how comfortable Annabeth is climbing onto Clarisse’s back. It’s their faces that feel different- hollow cheeks and more prominent bone structures. They look more mature than they did when they were eighteen- happier, healthier,  _ older _ .

When did that happen?

She takes a long, somewhat melancholic sip of her rosé and watches Silena and Clarisse struggle into their heels. There are some things, she thinks, that you have full control over- like what heels to wear with this red skirt, or whether you really should be drinking any more alcohol when you have a flight to catch early the next morning. And then there are things you can’t control at all- like whether Kanye West is actually going to be the surprise headliner for the night, or how far away Athens is from New York City. What sucks the most, Annabeth thinks, are the events you can only exercise  _ some _ control over- the ones with two shitty options to choose from.

Time can be  _ such _ a bitch.

*

Everything that means anything in New York culminates at Neon Classic; it is loud and obnoxious and absolutely fucking  _ beautiful _ .

Annabeth follows Silena and Clarisse down the steps, past the neon signs and the drunk couples pressed up against posters of all the most iconic performances at the venue. She tries not to look too hard- there is a fair chance that she’s going to see Percy tonight; this is after all  _ their _ kind of night- and she thinks she might actually die if she were to catch him locking lips with anybody that wasn’t her.

There is comfort in how dark it is. She can hear Steflon Don on stage, feel the beats of her music under her feet- and for one moment, it’s easy to get lost in the atmosphere. For just one moment, she is able to close her eyes and breathe out, slow and steady-  _ this _ is New York, she thinks. This is her youth. This is goodbye.

Clarisse and Silena manage to squeeze their way through the crowds, pushing as close as they can to the stage. Clarisse holds her hand as they scream the words until her throat is raw. Annabeth doesn’t care about what she might feel tomorrow- doesn’t care about a single moment other than right now. The world is ending and she’s going out with one final dance.

She lets Clarisse twirl her around and pretends to have her eyes closed to excuse herself for not apologising to the boy she trips over. God. She should have had her eyes closed. 

The music doesn’t stop, but it should have. Steflon Don should have taken a breather, and the party goers should have frozen in their places, and the Earth should have halted. He’s standing there, all the way at the back, leaned against the bar, and it’s all Annabeth can do not to break free from the suddenly suffocating horde of people closing in on her and run into his arms. He doesn’t see her- she can barely see him- but she knows that posture, knows that hair that sticks up at odd angles and those shoulders that have carried her burdens for fifteen years.

In any other world she might have. She might have seen him, a blaring beacon of light on a dark, windy night. He might have shone on her, bright enough for only his eyes, and she’d press herself to him, her lost lips finding comfort in his and her fingers fitting perfectly between his. In any other world, they’d be designed for each other- bodies and minds and everything in between. It hits her like a ton of bricks that it is true in any other world but theirs. Here, on this Earth that won’t stop spinning and against time that won’t stop ticking, the distance between them is definite. It is  _ correct _ .

She stands still for long enough for Silena and Clarisse to notice, long enough that Silena grabs her hand and yanks her forcefully back to reality.

“Did you know he was going to be here?” Silena asks and she looks almost disappointed. Annabeth realises with a pang of guilt that she  _ is _ disappointed- they’d spent the whole day together and now it just looks like Annabeth had done it all just for a second shot at Percy. 

“I had a feeling.” Annabeth confesses and Clarisse dances her way around, standing firmly in Annabeth’s line of sight.

“You know we can’t let you go say hi.” She yells over the speakers. Annabeth opens her mouth to make some kind of excuse but Clarisse shakes her head.

They’re getting too old to be babysitting each other. Annabeth looks between them and she can tell Silena’s gearing up to start an argument with her. A lump forms in her throat and she shakes her head.

“I need to pee.” She announces.

“I’ll come with-” Silena starts.

“No. Because I’m a  _ grown _ woman. I don’t need you to look after me.”

There is some poison in her words- enough that Silena backs off. Annabeth shoves past them and for one moment, she considers breaking away and heading straight to him. She is drunk and high and heartbroken and full of pain and nerves. How is she meant to face him like this? She decides better of it and makes a beeline to the toilets.

She pulls out her phone. She can  _ call _ him, right? Hear his voice one more time. She pulls out her phone and locks herself in the cubicle and just as she scrambles to unlock her phone, there’s a loud  _ THUD _ ! Of a body slamming against her door. Annabeth starts and drops her mobile- right into the basin. The girl who’d thrown herself against the cubicle giggles a loud, drunken apology and Annabeth curses under her breath, getting to her knees and desperately trying to salvage her last direct line to Percy.

“Motherfucker.” 

Annabeth gives it a valiant effort, really, she does- but there are some lines to be drawn with regards to putting ur hand down a public toilet bowl-  _ especially _ one that drunk girls have been spewing into all night. She gives up and gets to her feet hopelessly. She washes her hands for far longer than she might have needed to and steps out to find her friends. They’re not where she left them, she realises- but not before noticing that Percy isn’t where he was, either.

“Hey, Annabeth.” A voice says. She turns around to find Luke Castellan standing over her, hands in his pockets and an easy smile on his lips. “Glad you could make it.”

“Luke-,” Annabeth starts, and then realises she has nothing to say to him. She lets out a sigh. “Have you seen Silena and Clarisse?”

Luke looks over his shoulder like he expects to find them right behind him. He shakes his head and gestures with his chin towards the exit.

“I have  _ not _ , but I’m headed to the afterparty at the Tap. Come with me, the chauffeur’s just pulling the car around.” Annabeth opens her mouth to protest, but Luke cuts her off. “You have a better shot at finding them there.”

_ What about Percy, _ a small voice in her head asks.  _ Will he be there too? _

“Fine.” She says.

Her friends are adults; they’d find their way to her. Besides, this was  _ Luke _ . She’s known him almost her entire life. She shrugs her shoulders and lets him press his palm on her back as he leads her into the cold evening air. Outside, the world comes into clearer view. The throbbing beat fades into the background and a breeze blows into her hair, cool over her sweaty forehead. Luke doesn’t wait half a second before shucking off his sports jacket and draping it over her shoulders, and Annabeth doesn’t thank him.

“It’s cold outside.” He says, bouncing on the balls of his feet and craning to look, presumably, for his car. Annabeth stares numbly ahead, at the chippy that she and Percy would stumble into after every Neon Classic, just so they could fall short of change and share a single box of chips between them. Annabeth likes vinegar on hers. Percy likes his drenched in ketchup. They both revelled in the argument.

A car finally pulls up and Luke holds the door open for her. He’s always been a gentleman. Annabeth clambers in and lets him shut it after her before coming in through the other door. They ride in silence and Annabeth looks out of the window. New York is even more beautiful in the dead of the night, she thinks- with her twinkling lights and bridges. Her brain begins to stir, awakening from its drunken stupor, conjuring up images once more of what might have been had she and Percy grown old together on these streets, but this time she can shut it down.

Within twenty-four hours, she will be starting a new life in Greece. She’ll have to make new friends and move into a new apartment and start a new job. She’ll have a full life, she promises herself. Full so there is no space for thoughts of what might have been.

“I’m really sorry.” Luke says quietly. Annabeth jumps slightly. She’d forgotten he was even there. She looks at him and he stares right on ahead. “About you and Jackson. I really thought-  _ hoped- _ you would be the ones to last.”

It doesn’t mean much- not an apology, not from him. She doesn’t know what to say. She shrugs his jacket off of her and crosses her arms over her chest to stop her teeth from chattering.

“When I-,” Luke pauses. He looks unsure of whether or not he wants to continue. “When I told you I loved you,” he starts again and Annabeth waits. “I meant it. I know- I know you thought I was just messing you about, but I did. I meant it. You were with Jackson, and you know, I knew that I’d missed my window.”

“That was seven years ago.” Annabeth tells him. “You don’t have to explain anything to me now.”

“But I do.” Luke insists. “I loved you and it hurt me more than anything in the world. I loved you then, and if I’m being honest- a part of me still loves you now. I fucked up. I missed my chance with you- but you have to understand that I  _ loved _ you.”

“I’m moving to Europe in six hours.” Annabeth tells him. If this is Luke’s way of shooting his shot, it’s far too little- and possibly way too early. He lets out a small, breathy laugh.

“No, that’s not what I meant.” He says. He meets her eye, then. “I just mean that the hurt was worth it, you know? You are worth all that pain. Seeing you with him, knowing it could have been me- that’s the kind of heartbreak I won’t- I  _ can’t  _ get over. But I’m glad I have it.”

“Why?”

“Because it means what I felt was true.” Luke’s voice is just above a whisper. “What kind of a relationship would it be if you didn’t miss him when it ended? This pain that you’re in right now- be grateful for it.  _ Live _ in it. What you had with Percy was big, you know? It was  _ real _ love. Nine whole years. It was a successful relationship.”

“You still love me?” Annabeth waits until they pull up at the nightclub to ask. Luke is earnest in the way he meets her eye, and when he nods, she can see him swallow nervously. In the dark, lit up only by the streetlights, he looks like the highschool sophomore who doted on Annabeth, just before things took a turn and he froze her out entirely. 

“I couldn’t tell you one single reason why,” He lets out a small, sad laugh. A man who had made peace with her never being able to love him the same way. “But yeah. Of course I do. And Percy does, too. I have a feeling he will, for a long,  _ long _ time.”

It hits her then, like a massive train and straight to the chest. She sits up too quickly, sending all the blood rushing to her head. She gets out of the car and Luke finds her again, placing his jacket gently over her freezing shoulders once more. People are filing in, desperate for an escape from the autumn chill, and Luke starts to lead her in.

Annabeth hesitates. She knows what she has to do- she knows that she has to end it if she wants to start a new life tomorrow. Still, there is a nagging feeling- somewhere behind those doors is her greatest love. She doesn’t know if he's waiting for her or hiding from her. Maybe he isn’t even thinking about her. But he is there, and she is here, breathing, one last time, the same air as him. Able to dance, one last time, under the same moon as him. There is a chance, an opportunity- for her to find him, to tell him once, finally, that she loves him.   
  


Luke moves in her periphery, to greet a friend, and she takes him in. Luke Castellan, the poster child for missed opportunity- and she knows she can’t go in.

“I have to go.” She calls to him. He frowns and starts to argue, but Annabeth shakes her head. “Please, I-I have somewhere else to be. Just tell Silena and Clarisse when you see them that I have one last goodbye to say.”

She doesn’t wait for an answer. There’s an underground station two blocks away and she is already running.

* * *

Their story ends like this:

She sits alone at the fountain. All of the city is sleeping, or partying, or throwing up with their head in a toilet basin. Annabeth sits alone at the Bethesda fountain, and that is how it ends. There is nobody around to watch her as she runs her fingers over the concrete tiles. They are broken, now- shattered into a million pieces. They didn’t burn the world down with their love, they didn’t get caught up in some strong current and drown. They chipped, and they chipped and then one day, they became rubble.

That is how they end.

They’d dreamed of this; dreamed of growing old together. They fell hard and they got hurt in the process. She supposes nobody ever thinks about the part of growing old that feels an awful lot like growing apart. She closes her eyes and rests her back on the basin wall and looks up at the starless sky.

Tomorrow will be a fresh day- she’ll start a new life, and, she suspects, so will he. He’ll start a life right here, without her, and that will be an experience comparable to moving halfway across the world. He’ll make new memories with people she won’t know, and one day, she thinks she will be fine with that. How can she not be? She’s about to jet off to Europe and embrace herself as who she is now, at this moment in time. He’ll achieve everything he’s ever wanted, and she’ll have all she can ask for; but they will have nothing but fifteen years of kindness and warmth and memories.

One day, she hopes, she’ll even be able to think of them. She’ll relive them, and all they were _ , _ with her family and maybe she’ll show them the city they painted red with the blood in their veins.

He comes to her, then- she knows him by the weight of his step. She looks up and he stands over her, beanie over his ears and small smile on his lips and the unspoken _ I’m sorry _ hangs in the air between them. For a moment, nothing happens- and then he sits down next to her and holds her hand but his skin doesn’t feel like home anymore.

“I knew I would find you here.” He says. The night is motionless and every word is heavy.

“I knew you’d come.” Annabeth replies.

“I did. And… I’ll come with you.” Percy shakes his head. “It’s not worth… this.”

Annabeth looks at him, a man of Manhattan’s soil. She can’t take him away from here, just like he can’t anchor her down. The Percy Jackson she met for the first time fifteen years ago is not the one she fell in love with nine years ago. The Percy Jackson sitting in front of her is neither. He’s a man now- a man with broad shoulders and a gentle heart, a man deserving of love and affection and extraordinary things.

She had wanted nothing more than to hear him say those words- for weeks, for months- but they settle in the space between them now and she understands how wrong it is. Luke’s words come to mind again and she understands him- Percy Jackson- the boy, the teenager, the man- he is worth the heartbreak, the grief and the loss. He is worth carrying all the pain of the world, and Annabeth knows when she speaks that she is true.

“You were right.” She can’t go any higher than whisper. “We have been over for a while.”

“I don’t want to go on like this.” Percy’s voice shakes. 

“But you will.” Annabeth tells him softly. “And somewhere, under the same sky, I will too- but we can’t.”

Percy’s hand slips out of hers and she tries to think of the last time she’d held his hand and felt his pulse against her wrist. She wishes she’d known- the last time they’d had an honest conversation, the last time they’d said  _ I love you _ to each other, the last time they’d had sex on the kitchen counter. If she could go back in time, she’d tell herself to savour it- savour every moment she had with him, because one day he’ll be a figment of her imagination and his hand will feel cold as a corpse.  _ Forever will end, _ she would tell herself.  _ Until then, enjoy the ride. And when forever is over, embrace the hurt that comes after _ .

One day, Annabeth imagines she’ll wake up and her heart will feel fine. She’ll see Percy’s smiling face on her Instagram and it won’t hurt her. She’ll be able to close this chapter and move on. This pain feels like it will last forever; but forever has ended before.

When her eyes open, she is still lying on the fountain. There is no sign that Percy was ever here, and she’s not entirely surprised. She needed to have that conversation- it didn’t really matter if it was with him or herself. She sits up and pulls her joint out, lighting it carefully. She breathes it in; a slow, deep breath. She focuses on the way her lungs expand and watches her blunt burn.

She stares ahead and pictures him once more. This time he is only standing there. Smiling at her. Tears begin to form in her eyes, but now she doesn’t fight them. She loved that smile- she  _ loves _ that smile. Her lungs reach their maximum capacity and she pulls the spliff out from between her lips. She holds her breath for one moment, gaze fixed on some version of Percy Jackson.

_ Easy on the exhale _ .

She breathes out slowly, and with every little bit her chest deflates, he becomes a little bit blurrier. There are a thousand ways to say goodbye- one last kiss, one last shared meal, one last holiday together. Annabeth understands that there are things she could say- things she  _ wants _ to say to him-  _ thank you, fuck you, you’re welcome, I’m sorry _ . It’s too late now. Percy is fading and they’ve hit the end of the road. 

That is how her best friends find her.

“I  _ told _ you that’s where she’d be.”

“‘One last goodbye.’ God, she’s such a sap.”

“Says the girl who just made it official with her girlfriend.”

“Shut up, Silena.”

They find her half way through the joint and Clarisse plucks it out of her fingers. Silena throws her arm over her shoulders and presses a kiss to her cheek. Annabeth doesn’t say anything. She takes in another breath, of New York City’s pollution and commotion. The three of them sit there together in silence, the only sound being the buckles on Silena’s boots knocking against each other as she plays with her legs.

“So.” Clarisse says after a while. Annabeth turns to look at her but her gaze is fixed on something in the distance. “I suppose you can say that Thalia is  _ officially _ my girlfriend.”

Annabeth watches as a smile grows on Clarisse’s lips, and she can’t help mirroring it. “About fucking time.”

“They even said their  _ I love you _ s. I was there.” Silena interrupted. Obviously her friends had been busy when she was gone. Annabeth presses a kiss to Clarisse’s cheek.

“Aw, Clair-Bear’s in  _ love _ .” Annabeth sings and Clarisse pushes her off.

“Don’t call me that.” She grumbles. “And it’s very convenient that Silena left out how I walked in on her getting some- a whole  _ lot _ , really- with this guy at the Tap.”

“What?” Annabeth cries, and Silena turns bright pink. “ _ Who _ ?”

“His name’s Charlie and I got his number and I  _ don’t _ want to talk about it right now. Shut up, Clarisse you’ve got such a big mouth.” Silena reaches over Annabeth and shoves Clarisse.

“You guys got up to so much without me. And both of you  _ will _ have to fill me in on all the details.” Annabeth laughs. “This is great, really.”

Annabeth takes Silena and Clarisse’s hands in each of hers and gives them a squeeze. The axis that she’d built her life on is shifting. Her friends are committing to serious relationships and moving on. Now it’s her turn. The sun will rise in a few hours and Silena and Clarisse will take her to the airport and she will board a plane. Come dawn, everything will change, and all that will remain are the people closest to her. 

“We’re going to be okay.” Silena says softly, as if she can read her mind. “We’re all going to be just fine.”

“Oh, we’ll be pretty fucking  _ great _ .”

* * *

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thank u 10000000000 to my lovely friends who helped me thru this teehee @nerdylizj @thebeautifulgeneral @thelittledeformednut and @snowhalfwhite <333 love u so much xxx
> 
> also i never do this bc i forgot this was a thing but find me on tumblr @andygarfy lol xox


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